


Chasing Miss Granger

by Leni Jess (Leni_Jess)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Community: hp_springsmut, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-09-03
Updated: 2011-09-03
Packaged: 2017-10-23 09:27:07
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/248772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Leni_Jess/pseuds/Leni%20Jess
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lucius Malfoy decides that courting the influential and esteemed Miss Granger would improve his social and political standing in the post-war wizarding world; Hermione decides that allowing him to do so would give her a clearer understanding of pureblood thought and intent, the better to keep them in their place. Then things get a little out of control.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Chasing Miss Granger

Lucius Malfoy summoned the Dictaquill – making sure it was the one spelled not to amend his thoughts in the slightest – and set it hovering above the parchment, drawing a line down the centre. On the left he set out the handicaps that had dogged Malfoy fortunes for the ten years since the War ended, and on the right the actions or events that had improved his and his son's situation.

His wife's departure was one of the early left-hand items, balanced by the fairly amicable divorce a year later. He hadn't wanted it, but Cissy had stuck to it that she wouldn't trust his judgement any further. Since in her view that had been defective through most of their marriage (following Voldemort would look like that, he knew, in hindsight; it wasn't as if she had objected at the time), the break had been unavoidable.

He had become reconciled to it, since Draco went right on living at home and talking to him over breakfast.

A big plus, the biggest possible ever, on the right hand side, was the departure of Voldemort; but though that improved the quality of their lives, it did little for their reputation, seeing they had been constrained to follow him to the end.

Another big plus was Dumbledore's departure. The manipulative old devil would never have trusted him, and despite what Severus's portrait upstairs said about the former Headmaster's care for Draco's soul, he had taken risks enough with his body, just as he had done with his Gryffindor lambs, Potter and Granger and Weasley, and indeed every member of his private army, not least Severus. Life was easier for everyone (or at least less strewn with traps) with him gone, even though he had taken worthier men, like Severus, with him.

This list, when he finished it, looked much better than the one he had drawn up three years ago. Still, the balance was by no means even. The Malfoys needed something more to restore them to full respectability, even if Lucius no longer thought seriously about being the, or even a, power behind the Minister or whoever was nominally in charge of the wizarding world.

After a while he inscribed three names at the foot of the right hand column, and contemplated them. If he were any kind of Arithmancer, he could convert all this to equations, and find a solution. As it was, he would have to rely on knowledge, intuition, and a certain talent for jumping out of the way of disaster at the last minute. That was something he preferred not to need, nowadays.

After a while he crossed out Harry Potter's name. Potter had been surprisingly generous, after the War, and on better acquaintance Lucius had realised some of that was due to Potter's great respect for unshakeable family affection. That Lucius and Narcissa had in the end put Draco's good above anything else, including their own survival, and certainly above the triumph of their master, had in Potter's eyes cancelled out their politics.

However, Potter was married now, and his wife loathed Lucius with all her being, and had no fondness for Draco, either. She, like all her family, carried a grudge to extremes, making no allowance for necessity, if some Weasley happened to suffer minor damage. Ginevra Potter had a lot in common with Tom Riddle, in that way. Lucius acknowledged that some of that was his own fault. Potter's Weasley wife seemed able to curb any of Potter's remaining impulses towards generosity where a Malfoy was concerned.

Lucius considered the next name for longer. Kingsley Shacklebolt was still Minister of Magic, and looked set to remain so for many years; nor did Lucius object to that. The man was refreshingly efficient and effective, and did not allow himself to be swayed by Order of the Phoenix prejudices. No doubt being the law, rather than a guerrilla opposing it from within, had something to do with that change. Shacklebolt had given Lucius good value, and never in return for anything so crude as the income supplements Fudge had required.

The Minister responded favourably to cooperation with prosecutions and Ministerial Commissions of Enquiry, and to donations to St Mungo's. He approved Lucius's active membership of the new Muggleborn Registration Commission, whose task was orienting Muggleborn children to the wizarding world long before they received their Hogwarts letters. (Lucius very much admired whatever bold master of irony had re-used the name formerly redolent of fear and loathing, but he would never have dared to make such a suggestion himself.) Shacklebolt had listened when Lucius had suggested that the Hogwarts Board of Governors, like the Commission, needed proportional representation of both purebloods and Muggleborns.

However, the Minister saw no need to ease Lucius's path for love or sympathy or whatever political advantage might accrue, and Lucius knew better than to try to manoeuvre him into a position where the latter might come into play.

Lucius did not cross that name out, but a flick of the fingers at the Dictaquill converted the black ink to a neutral grey.

The last name... He had met her occasionally, and more frequently over the last year, at meetings of the Muggleborn Registration Commission, and knew she had been active in developing proposals for the Commission from its beginning. He had heard about her for most of the post-war years, and at intervals seen the Ministry and even the Wizengamot reeling in the wake of her activities. And if as often as not they surged back to the rocks to which they stubbornly clung, the perch was lower on the rock, and more subject to the tide of change, than before.

Kingsley Shacklebolt favoured her; Harry Potter was still a close friend; and her record at the Ministry was impressive, not least because she was Muggleborn and had had so much to learn about how the wizarding world worked. She had learned, oh yes, and her peculiar range of talents and interests made her something that Muggles apparently called a generalist: someone who was expert in several separate fields.

How might Hermione Granger be used to improve the Malfoys' standing? What might she be prepared to do for them, and in exchange for what? Her principles were still tiresomely unbending, but she had learned to bargain, and to dissimulate, and even, perhaps, to comprehend the viewpoint of conservative purebloods anxious at the prospect of their world being brought to Muggle notice. She had even bowed to reality in recognising that house-elves needed the sense of belonging that being bound to a house, and sometimes to a family, gave them. What could he offer her, how convince her that modern wizarding society would be more stable, more fair to all, if the Malfoys had their rightful place of influence again?

His influence with his fellows would be a benefit she would appreciate, but her own political position meant she could not fall into bed with them; too many of her adherents still feared and distrusted the pureblood agenda, greatly modified by circumstance as it had been.

Fall into bed... Lucius smiled wryly at the prompting of his subconscious. He had dismissed the notion of literally seducing her, dismissed it without even thinking it, possibly because of Draco's account of her final split with the youngest Weasley boy after two years of patience with his whims and prejudices and inadequacies. Attack canaries, Draco had said feelingly, might sound like the makings of farce, until one saw their results. Lucius happened to know that she and Kingsley Shacklebolt had ended their meticulously discreet affair without any such demonstrations of pique and anger; they seemed to work together as easily as ever, while holding to their separate viewpoints and responsibilities.

If she had had a lover since, Lucius had seen no sign of it, though there had been the odd murmur, from some fellow members of the Commission, of a Muggle, some senior man in their current political hierarchy. If true, the woman was uncommonly tolerant for a witch of such abilities. If she could sustain such an affair across the barrier of the Statute of Secrecy (even if the man was senior enough to have knowledge of the wizarding world), she was patient and careful. If true, she might be drawn to power, which Lucius could give her, despite his current handicaps. No doubt if Lucius made the offer, and was courteous and considerate, he would not be pecked to death or exposed to ridicule, even if she refused him.

Lucius tapped his fingers thoughtfully on the parchment, and wondered whether a different offer might not be a better manoeuvre. Hermione Granger was handsome, intelligent, accomplished, well regarded. She would be an ornament to his name, in the modern world: an instant key to acceptance by a part of the wizarding world that still saw him as the enemy. She would probably be an ornament to his dinner table, too, and a good deal more than an ornament in his bed. Her former attachment to the Weasley boy, who had achieved no more than being a salesman for his brother's inventions, was no great advertisement for her taste, but she had been very young, and quite isolated, Lucius thought indulgently. If she could attract, and keep for three years, a politician as skilled as Shacklebolt, and part from him amicably, she had grown up, in all sorts of ways, and could make him a worthy wife.

There. He had thought it, and the house had not collapsed about his ears. Perhaps it was time for the Malfoys to take a more positive step into the future of the wizarding world.

He would ask her to dinner before the Commission's next meeting, on the pretext of discussing a proposal he wished to make. His proposal would need to be real, substantial, and thoroughly researched, and yet need input from someone of her background. Lucius leaned back in his armchair to develop something suitable, and summoned a house-elf to bring him a glass of chilled white wine to assist his deliberations.

+++LM+++HG+++

Lucius had served on the Muggleborn Registration Commission for several years (volunteering had been yet another step on his path to social rehabilitation), but Miss Granger had recently been appointed its secretary. That gave her the power not only to set the agendas, but also to record the outcomes of any discussions. She took full advantage of it, he noticed. She also reported directly to the Minister, and he had little doubt that Shacklebolt intended her to control the Commission, regardless of its amiable Chairman. Arthur Weasley ran a meeting with surprising efficiency, but he was still remarkably ill-informed about Muggles.

Lucius was not surprised that she agreed to his luncheon invitation to discuss his proposed innovation. Not only was she protective of Muggleborns, and anxious that the wizardborn should understand the Muggle world, even if it never impinged on their lives, but she would also be slightly suspicious of anything a Malfoy and an open conservative proposed in that general area. If she was just she would not be wholly suspicious of his intentions, as Lucius had behaved with remarkable propriety and helpfulness in his several years on the Commission, but he did not object to luring her into closer contact by letting her worry about what a pureblood might wish to see taught in Muggle Studies.

While he planned to use her standing and reputation to improve his, he could still offer her useful political insights and even more useful alliances, and he had observed, over the years, that Miss Granger tended to be in favour of anything that gave conservative and radical wizards a common ground, provided it was rational and peaceful.

Nor would he be deceiving her. These days Lucius was very much in favour of peace, and also of rationality; long exposure to the former Dark Lord tended to have that effect on anyone who survived the experience with his sanity intact.

Miss Granger asked him to owl his proposal to her beforehand, so that she could discuss it with full understanding. A discreet and courteous way of ensuring he was not wasting her time, and of serving notice that she would not tolerate deception. It suggested a Slytherin might be comfortable with her.

Lucius sent it the same day, though not as soon as he reached home, as he could have done: he had no intention of seeming anxious for her patronage.

His efforts and her cooperation would be useless to both of them if critics could suggest she could be bribed with a sixty-galleon meal. Her salary was almost certainly not commensurate with her reputation or her influence. He chose a quiet, pleasant Muggle place in Salisbury, the Muggle town he knew best, with good food and service, and no ostentation. He discovered that she responded well to being invited to help choose the wine, once each had chosen their meals, and ate modestly, as he did, though she enjoyed her food.

She discussed his proposal to provide initial funding for Muggle Studies classes at Hogwarts that should be available from first year, not just after OWLs as an optional course. She didn't remind him of Charity Burbage, who had died in his home for teaching the subject, which was kind as well as polite of her. She asked whether he thought it should be a required subject.

Lucius hesitated, before he said, "It probably should. I've realised that, however secret we wish to keep ourselves from Muggles, we should educate the wizardborn to be comfortable in that outside world, as we have begun to educate the Muggleborn in ours. It might be best if the course first established itself as valuable to students not brought up in the Muggle world – and accurate, and demanding, so that it should not be an easy option for the Muggleborn or for halfbloods who live in both worlds."

She said thoughtfully, "A good enough course could provide sufficient orientation in the four years to OWLs, leaving the students free to choose more academically demanding subjects, which would be helpful to them in their careers, at NEWTs level."

He nodded. "The intensity of magic at Hogwarts means that students will not be able to familiarise themselves with Muggle technology, such as that computer I see you referring to at Commission meetings. Yet their society uses machinery so much, to substitute for magic..."

"My computer is heavily shielded, with an array of charms I renew regularly. However, it might be possible to set up a study centre in a magic-free area where students might go for, say, an immersion course of a week every term, and teach them, among other things, how to shield their own electronic devices. Students might wish to join vacation courses, too, in their later OWLS years."

"Could children ever use the technology at Hogwarts, though? Isn't it quite demanding magic, to isolate such devices from the influence of magic itself?"

"They could learn the simpler charms. But," she smiled, "many generations of Muggleborns have tried, I'm sure, to spell devices from home to work at Hogwarts – whether a computer to help with study, or some device to play the music they're used to – and failed, abysmally. However, I believe it would be possible to set up shielded areas within Hogwarts where computers, if not CD players and the like, could be safely used without fear of being destroyed."

"Why not devices for leisure use?"

"Even protecting computers needs a considerable expenditure of magical energy, and it's probable the Muggle Studies teacher might be reluctant to give so much for mere entertainment. After all," she pointed out, "unless a wizard has considerable power, he can't keep many Muggle devices operating in a magical environment. Some might choose to run an iPod, or a television, but while they are at school the priority ought to be on what's useful for study."

Lucius murmured, "We copied their trains, their radios. Perhaps we should look into copying other devices, which have been in use long enough to show themselves helpful, not merely fashionable."

She grinned at him. "An opportunity for sales for Malfoy Enterprises?"

"And employment opportunities for Muggleborns educated in the use of their parents' technologies," he said calmly. "I don't think I should care to put such a research and development project in the hands of wizards who were ignorant of them."

Their lunch was pleasant and profitable. Lucius had worked hard on his proposal, his opening move in the siege of this handsome and well-positioned fortress; Miss Granger had shown real interest and had made some valuable suggestions. Best of all, she agreed to a follow-up meeting.

+++LM+++HG+++

After a few dinners and lunches, it became obvious that Miss Granger found him useful. His proposal had been refined, funding and its sources had been discussed in detail, and she was putting it on the agenda for the late May meeting. Since they had also discussed his proposals with the Headmistress of Hogwarts and then the Muggle Studies teacher (though not, yet, the board of Governors) it was even possible that the revised course might begin, in a small experimental way, in the next academic year.

With each meeting his paper was less discussed; she led him more and more into sharing with her the pureblood viewpoint on specific matters of interest to her and through her to the Minister. That was a matter for congratulation quite separate from his ambition to court her: to be accepted as a reliable source by a person with real power in the new government, who encouraged other Ministry officers to listen to him. Once it had been he who had dropped into the Ministry, pockets weighed down by galleons, often enough, to discuss issues of interest with Fudge, to make suggestions that were disguised orders. It was even possible that this way was more effective as well as cheaper, since he was no longer relying solely on his influence, however procured, on a single individual.

Shacklebolt invited him to a meeting of senior functionaries, to brief them on some aspects of land tenure that affected both Muggle and wizarding worlds. Very dry, and a lot of hard work beforehand, going through generations of Malfoy records, but a considerable triumph that the Minister not only relied on him to be clearer and possibly more practical than an archivist-lawyer would be, but also trusted him to be honest and not to slant his information.

While it was beginning to seem that simply associating with Miss Granger, and making himself useful to her and to the Minister, was rapidly improving his acceptance in government circles, Lucius still clung to his original plan. Public acceptance, after all, was quite as necessary.

Unfortunately, Lucius had realised by now that it would be far easier to succeed in seducing Miss Granger than in courting her with a view to marriage. That was a pity. He would be quite happy to do the first, but his long-term plans would be far better served by the second. Even though, in the official view, he would be less able to influence either the Minister or Ministry policy-makers as a consequence of marriage to one of their own, he doubted that any of them would be ready to abandon a useful resource. The wizarding world had not yet been infected by the Muggle taste for visible righteousness.

His meetings with the young woman extended beyond shared meals discussing matters of interest to government. The late winter weather was still cold, so he invited her to concerts, and then to the Muggle opera – not the ostentatious and unwieldy affair at Covent Garden, but a smaller-scale theatre in the north which was presenting Mozart's _Magic Flute_.

He was surprised when she said over coffee afterwards, approvingly, "Having the high priest and all his people played by black singers is a neat way of getting round the prejudice implied in the original. His servant Monostatos is a nasty piece of work, but he's just a rotten apple, not the sole representative of what might otherwise be seen as an inferior group."

His ear was attuned to "Muggleborn" and even "halfblood" as an incitement to prejudice, and being careful how he spoke for ten years had not made him less alert to that and associated triggers. He understood that a member of a group could represent it, in observers' minds, but what had "black" to do with it? One could more easily assume that priests' servants were (for some odd reason) violent persons; it wasn't as if most wizards knew much about how priests behaved.

Cautiously he asked, "Why should the colour of a man's skin make anyone think him inferior?"

She looked at him thoughtfully. "That's one kind of prejudice the wizarding world is spared, but you don't get into the Muggle world much yourself, do you?"

He objected, "I work with quite a few Muggleborns – you yourself are just the most recent of those I see much of!"

"Yes, and Kingsley Shacklebolt is a pureblood..." She shrugged. "There's no need for you to interact socially with Muggles, certainly."

That was a relief. He had learned just how strong-minded Hermione Granger was, and did not care for the idea that she might think he should start doing so.

She went on, "Muggles have different prejudices, naturally, since they're not aware of magic and don't argue about which bloodlines produce the best witches and wizards."

Lucius didn't like the sound of that introduction. Since the war ended he had endured years of argument on that topic (and been convinced, however reluctantly, that his ideas had been misguided), and more of abuse (which no amount of reason could lessen).

"So they argue about?"

"Colour of skin. Racial origins. Religion."

He knew enough not to argue about religion, though quite indifferent to it himself. Some of the increasing numbers of Muggleborns in the wizarding world had kept up membership of various religious groups, especially when they remained in close contact with their families. Purebloods had on the whole abandoned religion, since the witch-burnings of years past had been motivated far more by religious belief, than by knowledgeable fear of magical skills and the superiority they gave.

"What has skin colour to do with anything? Why should it matter if a wizard is, what, Chinese? African, as Shacklebolt's ancestry obviously is? How can that affect magical power?"

"Not at all," she agreed. "Just take it that some Muggles – certainly not all – look down on people who are not white skinned, or European, and that the libretto of the opera was written at a time when such irrational prejudice was almost universal. In Europe."

"The opera libretto has enough stupid and ignorant things to say about women," he said thoughtfully. "I noticed, of course, that someone had tinkered with that, either text or presentation. So you're saying, having all the priests and the temple's servants played by dark-skinned people is trying to reduce the effects of another stupidity which wizards don't suffer from, but Muggles may?"

"Yes."

He shrugged. "Sensible. The audience might then think about the music and the heart of the plot, not about the silly ideas that even Muggles have outgrown. The plot after all," he smiled at her, "is silly enough. Although Tamino is supposed to be a prince of Java, they didn't bother to employ a singer with the appropriate looks."

"Java is far enough away to be fantasyland," she suggested, "and heroes of fantasy are of course members of the dominant social group."

They both laughed, and went on to discuss how fortunate it was that the heroine as well as the hero had been encouraged to undertake the quest for enlightenment. Miss Granger mischievously suggested that that one exception to the disregard for women in the opera was due to the need to have a female voice in more scenes than would have been possible had Pamina simply waited for Tamino to succeed in his quest.

"You could as well argue that it was because her mother is a powerful woman, and that the high priest wished to convert her daughter to support him rather than her mother. Politics, rather than musical balance."

"That too," she agreed cheerfully, leaning back in her seat and repressing a little yawn.

Perhaps he should not have suggested they have a glass of brandy with the coffee; alcohol did tend to make Miss Granger sleepy. He had every intention of exploiting that, some day, but it would not be useful tonight.

"It's time I took you home," he murmured.

She didn't object, and allowed him to side-along Apparate her to her front door, a fairly recent concession to what she thought of as old-fashioned manners.

He was quite sure Muggle men were willing to try their luck at a woman's front door, and he knew she was aware of, and did not seem to object to, the discreet admiration he had begun showing for her person as well as her mind. Perhaps it was time he took a chance.

Lucius put a hand under her chin and lifted it, very gently, a hint rather than a demand, and bent his head towards hers. She was shorter than Narcissa, which meant she was much shorter than himself, unfortunately, but he could see there might be advantages to that, later. Just not at her front door.

She smiled slightly at him and her lips parted. He felt a wild thrill of triumph that was not in the slightest political, and kissed her. Her mouth was soft and warm and welcoming; there was no need to be tentative in this, since she had signalled acceptance. He was free to give it his best, and to take everything she would give, too.

She pushed up close and wrapped her arms around his waist, holding on fiercely, standing on tiptoe to return his kisses. Soon her hands were tugging at his coat, trying to find their way in; she was sufficiently disoriented that she didn't think to use her wand. Lucius pulled back a little, and enjoyed her moan of complaint, appreciating the effect he had had on her already.

"Just one moment!"

He drew his wand and used it to open his clothes, and then hers. The weather meant that each was wearing several layers, but luckily he could tug her long skirt up, just as she could push coat and jacket, waistcoat and shirt back, so that she could get her hands on him, as he began to fondle her thighs above her stockings with one hand, using the other to push below the neckline of her dress to find her breasts. It was a little distracting that she was playing with one of his nipples, experimenting to see how sensitive it was, while her other hand roamed over his chest, up to his neck, and stroked behind his ear and over the nape of his neck under the fall of hair that she pulled free of its clasp.

She parted her legs further to let him stroke her more intimately, and pushed her breast into the hand that was cupping it inside her dress, and freed her mouth, gasping, just to be able to breathe, it seemed.

As his fingers slipped inside her knickers, teasing through the nest of curls, her hand moved boldly inside his trousers, finding his penis, stroking the slippery tip, before she clasped him firmly and began to roll his foreskin to and fro. He moaned involuntarily, and she made a soft sound of affirmation, pressing herself into his hand.

Her head tipped back, and the light above the enclosed porch leading into her flat showed her eyes closed, her teeth set in her full lower lip, her cheekbones flushed. Delightful. Lucius thought vaguely that he had never kissed a woman in the street before, never mind touched her so intimately, and he supposed he ought to care about their privacy. He had no intention of stopping now. Then her eyelids closed more tightly; the light must bother her. The rain was falling on her face, gently, but starring her eyelashes and her hair, the individual drops catching the light. When had that started?

Before he could stop her she pulled back, though not free of his hands, and looked at him, pupils dilated.

She gasped, "Wait, Lucius! Wait!"

He cursed silently even as he complied. Was she going to want to draw back now?

No. She took out her wand and used it to open the porch door, and then to extinguish both the outside light and the one that had automatically turned on as the outer door opened. The wand movements suggested that she had also disarmed several protective charms. She drew him inside and pushed the door to, but went no further into the flat.

He could just see that she shoved her wand hastily back in its sheath in the side of her evening coat before she came back into his arms. Lucius pushed her coat and the soft wool-silk shawl off her shoulders and to the floor, and shed his own coat and jacket, grateful for the soft dark that enveloped them. No more distractions for her.

It only took a moment to draw her skirts up to her waist again, and to pull her knickers down, shoving them down past her knees. She drew up first one foot then the other, pushing the inconvenience further down her legs and then off entirely, before she rubbed one foot up his calf, and used her knee to press gently into his groin, finding him hard, making him harder.

Then she was close and he could touch her, warm and wet and open for him.

"Show me how you like it!"

She took his hand without hesitation and pressed his thumb to her clit, stroking, then circling with it, and drew his fingers steadily up and down between her swollen lips.

Lucius took over, pushing one finger slowly into her, finding her tight, but wet enough that it was easy to open her further. He sped up and intensified the movement of his thumb, until he felt her tensing, and felt her hands gripping him harder. One was clenched in his back, the other wrapped around his cock. She was trying to slide her hand firmly up and down to encourage him, but was too lost in her own responses to be able to manage his.

"Yes!"

She was clenching rhythmically around his finger now, so he carefully pushed a second into her, and crooked them both upwards, probing, finding, stroking. She gasped and whimpered and tightened around him so that for a moment he could not move, before her climax rushed over her and he felt her muscles clamping down on his fingers, again and again, saw her head fall back, heard her soft triumphant sounds of pleasure, like a dove cooing to its mate.

He eased his grip on her and held her until she came down, trembling slightly, the tension leaving her body. She slumped against him, and slowly he withdrew his hand, bringing his fingers up to his nose to sniff appreciatively, then to his mouth to taste her.

"So fine," she murmured, taking more of her own weight at last, but not trying to pull free.

She lifted up again to kiss his mouth, and let him kiss her hard and deeply, eager to be satisfied. She returned his kisses, then her hand around his cock clasped him more firmly, her free hand pulled his trousers away to let her handle him more freely. She wasn't teasing now, but using all she had learned on him. One hand fisted him firmly, rhythmically, while the fingertips of the other rolled his foreskin further back from his cockhead, then one finger spread the ready moisture over it.

"Like this?" she asked. "Or different?"

"Hold my balls, squeeze them – not too tight, while you pull on me, do that harder, but no fingernails..."

She did as he asked, and he guided her with soft sounds of pleasure, unable to be silent now, for the short time needed until he came with a sigh of repletion, his cock jerking hard in her hands, his spunk jetting over her red velvet dress, showing up even in the dim light. She stroked him until he was finished, and able to do more than clench his hands in her hair and in the soft rounds of her arse. He pulled her close against him as her hands fell free and slid around his hips, holding him to her also.

"Soft sweet woman," he murmured.

He felt her mouth smiling against his neck, then her tongue licked briefly over the pulse at the base of his throat.

"You did like it. So did I. It was lovely, wasn't it?"

"Indeed. I can think of more to do with you, too."

She laughed softly, and licked him again, before she said, "Not tonight."

He accepted that. It seemed he would have other opportunities.

Then he set her back from him and used his wand to clean himself from her dress, before he set his own clothing straight. He used his hands to tidy her dress and drape her shawl about her shoulders once more, handing her coat to her. He left her with a final gesture, trailing fingers down her throat to the valley between her breasts.

"Go inside, now, and get warm," he said. "I'll Apparate from here; take care to set all your wards in place again."

"Yes, I will. Good night, Lucius. Thank you for – a very enjoyable evening."

Her hand touched his in a quick clasp, then she stepped back, and he left her.

+++LM+++HG+++

When spring arrived, it brought rain and overcast skies, but also some sunny days. Lucius had had the extensive grounds of Malfoy Manor, and the stable of Aethonians he had inherited from his father, to give him outdoor air and exercise, but Miss Granger had no such outlet.

He hesitated to invite her to the Manor, even though she would be unlikely to recognise either the drawing room where Bellatrix had tortured her (and he had made no attempt to stop it), or the dungeon (now a wine cellar) where her friends had been imprisoned, some for a long period.

He suspected Hermione (he was starting to call her that in his mind, now that she had shown herself amenable to physical intimacy) would need to commit herself to him, or at least be interested in doing so, before she would venture into his home. Many witches and wizards disliked going to Hogwarts these days, after all, though their memories of the great battle had had the same ten years to ease and soften. Those of them who had taken part in the rebuilding – himself and Draco included – had worked past that. Hard labour, even done by magic, might be beneath a Malfoy, but ingratiating themselves with their peers by such a means was not, and the work had meant Draco could go back to school to repeat his seventh year without nightmares. Or with fewer nightmares; Lucius was sure he and his son were not alone in still having those. He still woke with a start of grief and horror sometimes, in the recollection that Severus was not alive, as he had been dreaming him.

So, if he could not invite her to his home, where? Somewhere warmer than the rain-lashed north and midlands, less damp and dismal than London. His mind naturally went then to the counties west of his own Wiltshire, where the warm ocean currents created a more comfortable climate in sheltered parts, and on the exposed isles of Scilly, where herbologists were even now raising early flowers for the wizarding world's celebrations of spring.

There were no real wizarding enclaves in the southwest, of course; the Diagon Alley district and Hogsmeade were unique. However, there were Muggle places where a wizard did not necessarily have to deal with many Muggles, and some very attractive gardens. Hermione might like to walk in a garden and enjoy the spring flowers, the scent of fresh grass, the new leaves on the bushes, the freedom of the trees and their inhabitants, the birds and the prettier insects. He himself enjoyed watching damselflies and dragonflies glinting above the waters of the ornamental ponds and lakes at Malfoy Manor, and if the Muggle gardens did not have the Manor's population of half-wild kneazles to observe in play, a large Muggle garden would be bound to have squirrels. Maybe even native red squirrels not yet driven out by the invading grey.

Lucius decided to look up a spell to ensure he could call red squirrels for Hermione's amusement.

He discovered she had never been to Glendurgan in Cornwall where, he told her, the maze made a pleasant challenge to any Arithmancer to solve without magic. As he had suspected, that both appealed to her and put her on her mettle, since she used Arithmancy to investigate solutions to many complex social problems. She would enjoy the almost tropical garden, as he would. They agreed to go there on the next Saturday, if the weather was fine – a condition that most inhabitants of Britain would need to set all this spring and summer, it appeared. They had already compared the Muggle long-range weather forecasts she had access to using her computer, and the predictions of the private weather Arithmancy service Lucius paid an annual subscription to. Both parties seemed agreed on "gloomy" rather than "set fair".

Saturday was rainy, but Sunday was forecast to be fine, so Lucius Apparated to Hermione's front door, whose enclosed porch he had such fond memories of. Since then she had been careful not invite him into her flat, but she had not otherwise held him at arms' length, so he thought himself entitled to hope to advance, however slowly, this spring and summer. The metaphor of a fortress he might hope to induce to surrender seemed far more appropriate than that of a doe that he might hunt down.

Lucius had taken the trouble to do what the Muggles at Glendurgan would expect: to arrive by car (despatched beforehand to a quiet lay-by suitable for Apparating in to); to pay at the gate and not to fumble the Muggle money (whatever Hermione thought about his limited interactions with the Muggle world, he had long experience in using that); to be dressed in casual Muggle clothing of good quality (he noted with approval Hermione's flimsy sundress and the light linen jacket she carried, as well as the optimistic delicate pink hat of openwork straw); and to have a picnic lunch in what looked like an insulated carrier (which held more than it looked as if it could, and which had had a Featherlight Charm applied to it).

Hermione had looked him up and down, when he came to her door, and complimented him on his Muggle tailor; he remembered she had liked the look of him in Muggle formal dress, too, which had more than compensated for the mild feeling of being exposed without wizarding robes over his other clothing.

They walked slowly down the paths in the glacier-made steep valley, one of three that converged before the gardens came to the sea, pausing to look at the view of the Helford River, where it could be seen through the trees, and occasionally of the beach and the tiny Muggle village of Durgan. Camellias, azaleas and magnolias were in flower, and the latter were almost all richly scented. Lucius discovered that Hermione was particularly charmed by the massively sculptural white flowers of the bull magnolia, and took the opportunity to mention that he had a pair of them in the open woods behind the Manor. He also told her that while his garden-elves raised a selection of useful and ornamental wizarding plants in his greenhouses and conservatory, he had a personal preference for plants as nature made them.

She looked up at him from under the brim of that flirtatious hat and laughed softly. "And as generations of Muggle gardeners and wizarding herbologists have made them."

"One could say man was a force of nature," he suggested.

She reached out and took his hand, and he found himself delighted to wander through open glades of wildflowers holding her hand like a lovesick boy. He also tickled her palm and the webs between her fingers gently with a forefinger at irregular intervals, and rubbed his thumb over the delicate skin of her wrist, to remind her that he was a man, with a strong interest in her body, and knowledge of what pleased it.

Before they left the English oaks and beeches behind, he remembered to call for red squirrels. He took as much pleasure as she did in watching them scurry in haste but no concern for humans, across paths, up trees, through undergrowth, reappearing suddenly in a leap to the next tree trunk, fluffed-out tails erect for balance, bright eyes, pricked ears and alert noses taking in everything about them. Hermione knelt and managed to coax one to her held-out hand with only the tiniest touch of magic, offering an out-of-season acorn magically summoned from under the leaf litter. Lucius tried not to wish that she would turn to him, still on her knees, and touch him, perhaps not as lightly and carefully as she was touching her squirrel, before it accepted her offering and bounded off to conceal it.

After a while they came to a garden area more tropical than temperate, with tree ferns and palms, and small ponds with waterlilies in bursts of colour on their surfaces. There they found the dragonflies he had anticipated, bodies quivering in midair, suspended from their transparent wings, almost invisible save for the long dark bodies and the shimmer of colour in the moving air, darting down to the sun-glinting water surface to snatch prey too tiny to make out. Beautiful hunters. Lucius smiled at the fellow feeling. Hermione Granger was not precisely prey to an armed hunter, of course; more the slender doe to his mature male deer, choosing to accept him as a mate, or not. It was spring, and mating season: he could hope that would encourage her.

At last they came to the laurel maze and stopped to examine it carefully. They had a good view of it, on a sloping open hillside, but trees obscured some parts of the pattern.

Hermione said, "Would you wager that there is no place from which you can see the whole?"

"I would not. That's given, surely – we can see enough of the pattern of the hedges to get a feel for the maze, but not to map a path through it."

She nodded. "It's not a simple labyrinth where keeping one hand on the wall from the entrance would eventually lead you to the exit. I can see a number of hedges which don't connect to any other hedge, never mind to the boundary."

"The hedges curl like a snake in the sun."

"But unlike a snake are not a single organism. And those palm trees scattered through it – they're too much alike to serve as guideposts." She turned to him, eyes bright. "So you want me to find my way through without magic?"

"Save such help as arithmantic calculations could give," he agreed.

"Have you been through this maze yourself?"

"No, or any other, indeed. But it looks more challenging than some I have seen photographs of. Its being on a slope, which lets us see more of the pattern of the hedges than one normally does, is deceiving, I suspect, since we cannot see the complete pattern. Even if we could remember it all, once between the hedges."

Her smile was naughty, triumphant. "If I may use my wand – just to mark the path I've taken, not to map it ahead of us – I can guarantee to lead you to the exit."

"You are confident."

He liked that about her. He had discovered that she was not rash, not as she had once been, opposing Voldemort while still a child. Her confidence these days tended to be based not just on wide and careful reading, but also on reasoning and experiment. He was sure she could do as she said, but wanted to see her do it, and said so.

"It's not a mystery; I'll explain, when we're out."

"Don't spoil the surprise," he agreed.

She looked at the incongruously large Muggle watch on her wrist. "Shall we have our lunch inside, or in the gardens?"

"We saw no benches, or shade, except that silly little straw-roofed hut, nor grass, either."

"When we emerge, then," she agreed.

Lucius had long since shrunk the lunch pack even smaller and tucked it unobtrusively into a trouser pocket, and once they came into open ground she had draped her white jacket round her shoulders to keep the warm sun off.

He missed the sight of the smooth pale skin, but he could still see the nape of her neck, half obscured by tendrils of hair escaping from the loosely plaited crown that controlled without subduing the vibrant mass. Her hair was longer than ever, he suspected. One day he would get his hands in it, and his nose, and lick behind her ears and bite her nape... Maybe even today. There were some visitors, but none close to them, and he had seen that the maze was empty.

He decided he would keep it that way, but there was no need to tell her he was placing a Muggle-repelling charm on the entrance, unless it became necessary, to overcome any shyness she might feel. He had learned he could do small magics in her presence without her sensing it, if he was careful. So could she in his presence, of course; and he was looking forward to her taking out her wand, since it could only be strapped to her thigh.

Sure enough, it was; once inside the shelter of the hedges she removed it from the flimsy holster that magic held in place. She turned and flicked the wand minutely. He saw a small blue capital H, with an arrowhead on one upright, that pointed in the direction they were going, lay itself into the gravel path.

"No one will see it, except us, and I'll remove all my markers when we leave."

He approved that, not just because he too was tidy-minded. Leaving unnecessary traces had been trained out of Lucius Malfoy long ago.

When the path first split, Hermione stationed Lucius there and walked a few paces along the left-hand branch, enough to see around the corner.

She came back to report, "That's a dead end."

Lucius demanded, "Did you go to the end, or does it just _look_ like the path is blocked?"

"To the end."

Good; if she kept that up she wouldn't be deceived by hedge walls planted to look as if there was no way through.

Once onto the right-hand path, she paused to set her mark on it and on the path they had come along.

"Ah," Lucius said softly. "And if you come to a path you have been along before? A split where you've already taken both paths?"

"Repeat that part of the route, but once only, otherwise you could go round in circles forever. At some point, taking a new path will lead you into a new part of the maze. Eventually you'll get out, whether there is one viable path out, or more than one."

He paused to attempt to calculate in his head. He wasn't much of an Arithmancer, and gave up quickly enough, but it sounded logical. Later he could ask her to show him by diagramming their route on a page. That might be easier to understand than any theory behind it.

It was a large maze, as they already knew, and it took Hermione some time to navigate them to the centre. Several times they did come to a junction they had been through before, and in that case Hermione marked both paths with her sigil in red instead of blue. Always there was a route not taken that led them to new branches.

Eventually they came to that little straw-roofed hut. It proved to have benches, and a small table through which the centre pole supported the roof. Since it was not too long after noon, the roof provided adequate shade.

Hermione looked at her watch. "Lunch? Will this do? We could summon cushions."

"You're hungry." He didn't need to ask, and took out the lunch pack, using _Engorgio_ on it, adding, "I have cushions, and a blanket."

As well as cushions, blanket, a chilled bottle of white wine and two crystal glasses, the lunch pack proved to have two roasted quail, three different cold salads, plates and cutlery, napkins, condiments, extras such as juicy black olives and pickled walnuts, and slices of a Viennese-style cheesecake. There was also a flask of coffee and cups and saucers of fine china to match the plates.

Hermione sighed with happiness, eyeing the food with unabashed greed, and laid her jacket and hat on a spare bench.

"Your house-elves are excellent cooks," she observed, before biting into the quail leg she had twisted off with her fingers. She added, "They do a great picnic. Magic is marvellous – my parents could make up such a picnic, but we'd have killed ourselves carrying it all, and all this way."

Lucius had had to give only the most general of instructions to his kitchen elves. It was convenient, he had to admit, not being obliged to give detailed directions, as Narcissa had used to complain of before every dinner party. Of necessity these days he treated his house-elves better than he used to, and there had been unexpected benefits.

Before Miss Granger had left the Beings and Beasts Division she had ensured that all wizards must meet the standards she set for treatment of elves. Elves had rejected being unionised (a concept as strange to wizards as to them), but they had eventually accepted the idea of reporting unhappy experiences to a committee whose members, nowadays, were all elves, and who were free to inspect any place where house-elves worked. They were not free elves (that was still considered a shameful status) but were bound to the House-Elf Liaison Office (rather than to any Ministry employee). Nonetheless, they had what Lucius would once have considered a disgraceful independence and strength of mind, and had no problems with checking any suspect elf-employing household in wizarding Britain at short notice. As often as not, a badly behaved employer was reprimanded and fined before he found out there had been a visitation.

It had been a relief to discover that this supervision of such households did not infect his elves with either impudence or laziness. It was a little disconcerting to find that his house-elves appeared to be somewhat more intelligent these days, but they served as faithfully, so Lucius had taken the point that encouraging elves to think poorly of themselves and savaging them when he was out of temper were both counter-productive. Doors and walls did not respond as pleasingly to being kicked, so Lucius had gradually found other means of relieving his furies. They were much less common now that he no longer had a Dark Lord bullying and frustrating him, and ignoring his legitimate concerns.

For a while he had held this revolutionary change against Hermione (or, as he had thought of her then, _that interfering Mud – er, Muggleborn_ ), but it had not taken him long to realise that Miss Granger, once established as a successful and responsible Ministry employee, would be going through the wizarding world as well as the Ministry like a destructive wind that left the world reshaped beyond recognition behind it. Rather than be forcibly reshaped, Lucius had done it for himself.

For a while he had resented that necessity, too, but eventually he had realised that Miss Granger acted quite as much on Kingsley Shacklebolt's behalf as on her own radical principles. Resenting the Minister's policies might be actively dangerous. Most recently, he had found that courtesy and cooperation received a like response. He much preferred his present relationship with her.

When they finished lunch they talked idly, for a while, until Lucius used his wand to repack what remained and to set the reduced pack to one side, out of the way. Then he encouraged Hermione to join him in sitting on the table, so that, by looking uphill, they could see something other than laurel hedge. Naturally that brought her closer to him, and he slipped an arm about her shoulders.

"There's that bull magnolia," she said drowsily, pointing with the hand that was not resting on his thigh.

He answered only with a murmur, running his hand up her bare arm, cupping the point of her shoulder, and letting his fingers drift across her throat. She arched against him, and let her head fall back against his shoulder, so he slid his hand across all that delightfully naked skin and under the edge of her bodice. It was modest, showing only the very tops of her breasts, but it did not resist being shifted aside so that he could caress the tender flesh beneath. She sighed, her hand clamping briefly on his thigh, before she moved it further up.

Lucius sighed too. He did not think Hermione planned to tease him by calling a halt, even if he meant to take this further than she might now suppose. So long as he pleased her, she would allow him to continue; not only allow, he thought as her fingers slipped between his thighs and stroked inwards, but also encourage.

Experimentally he shifted on the table to see if that centre pole would support his weight (and eventually hers) without trembling. Yes – though he added a reinforcing charm to both pole and table nonethess; it would not do to have either collapse. After some mutually enjoyable explorations with hands and mouths he gripped her waist and swung her up and across, so that she was settled on his thighs, face to face and breast to chest, though he didn't yet press her so close that they were cock to belly and mound. He could feel the warmth of her body, as she would be feeling his, and feeling his cock hardening against her thigh, trapped there. She sighed again with pleasure, and slid her arms around his neck, one hand playing with his hair, held back with a silver clip, and the other caressing down the dip of his spine. They kissed again, softly and without haste, languorously, as if already satisfied. She shifted on him slightly, pressing herself into his ready cock, then did it again.

After a time she was trembling, her face and exposed breasts flushed pink with arousal; Lucius knew his own cheekbones would bear a high colour instead of the pallor natural to his skin. He slid his hands under her skirt and brought it up, allowing him to see as well as to touch her naked thighs, and to run his hands over her firm, slightly rounded belly, then trailed his fingers down to the edge of her narrow briefs, then under the edge, into the nest of curls and the warm damp flesh below.

"Oh Lucius, we can't, not out in the open..." That was said with pleasing reluctance.

He lifted one hand away from her to tap his wand, strapped to his forearm, visible since she had unfastened his shirt cuffs and pushed his sleeves up so that she could lick and nibble at the tender flesh they had concealed.

She made an interrogative sound, and shifted slightly once more to allow his hand freer access. She would probably let him continue without raising serious objections, but for her peace of mind, and to allow her to concentrate on him without any distractions, he said, "Charm." Her head lifted from his shoulder. "Repelling Charm," he expanded.

She gave him that naughty little grin. "Selfish wizard, keeping the poor Muggles out." She sighed and bent her head so she could lick his collarbone, and murmured, "Selfish me, too. Oh, that's niiiice!"

Lucius took his time. Indeed, he drew the foreplay out as far as he could, quite deliberately working to make her impatient. She enjoyed it, and made that plain, but eventually she was moving restlessly on him, adjusting their positions, trying to bring herself to where she could feel him hot and hard against her, rubbing against him. Lucius had no intention of allowing either of them to make do with mere frottage. He was going to come inside her, and before he did he was going to bring her to climax and maybe even a second, with him or as soon after as he could manage.

He freed his wand from its holster and murmured the charms to remove her clothing and his own. He didn't Banish them, but ensured that they piled up neatly on one of the benches, on top of their blanket. They would be leaving here later, and he didn't want any embarrassment to lessen the memory in her mind.

"Let me in," he said softly, and without hesitation she took him in both hands and guided him, lifting up, placing his cockhead at her wet entrance, then slowly gliding down, pausing to get used to his girth stretching her muscles, taking him until he was all the way inside her. Lucius thought that alleged Muggle lover was a myth; Hermione Granger hadn't had a man in quite some time.

He waited until she began to move on him, then gripped her hips and lifted her, brought her down, altering her position slightly so that the root of his cock ground against her clit with every stroke. He heard her gasp and felt her knees tightening on his thighs, felt her moving with him. Then he forced a hand between their bodies and began to rub a finger against her clit in the patterns she had taught him that night she had first given him hope of having her.

She whimpered and bit his neck; he whispered, "Yes, like that," and kept the pressure steady, relentlessly driving her forward, grinding his teeth in the attempt to hold his own orgasm back.

She was wetter, hotter, breathing as hard as he was, her nails digging into his shoulders, his back, urging him on, clenching around him, and he clung desperately to the necessity of not coming yet. Not yet. Her first. Show her how good he could make it. Show her how good she was.

He groaned, then her body tightened even further, her breathing halted for a long second, then she was gasping against his shoulder and her channel was rippling around him. She had risen to the heights and flung herself off, and he felt every moment of that glorious free fall, managing to halt his thrusts for just long enough.

Then he could let himself go, let his climax hammer out of him, teeth sunk into her shoulder to hold her in place, coming and coming. He heard her whimper, then she was clenching around him once more, in as fast a rhythm as she could, pulling the last of his orgasm out of him. He was gasping like the Hogwarts Express drawing out of Kings Cross, and let that life-saving central pole support him as his breathing at last quietened, his body eased, and the flush of heat on his skin died down. Then he became aware that though his mouth rested against her shoulder, there was blood on his lips.

Without lifting his head he asked, "How much does it hurt?" then licked at her, trying to estimate how badly he had bitten her.

"It will heal; it doesn't matter," she whispered.

He forced himself to look. Blood, yes, and her flesh was cut, but the bone beneath had prevented him from wounding her too deeply.

"Sorry; oh, I'm sorry, Hermione!" He licked the blood off, and a little more oozed through the cuts.

He hadn't done something so stupid, so heedless, in a very long time. So much for the perfect self-control he had meant to exercise, so much for showing her what a considerate lover he made! Mouth in a tight line, he took hold of his wand and spoke a cleansing charm, and then another to heal the wound and soothe the bruising.

He didn't want to meet her eyes.

"Hey, look at me," she whispered, and he forced his head up, ready to accept the reprimand he had invited.

"Thanks for fixing it."

He felt his eyes widen. She smiled, a little shaky, perhaps, but certainly not frightened or angry.

"Lucius, I'm pretty sure there's blood under my fingernails, too. I didn't want to scream – well, I did, but I didn't want to be heard! I don't think we cast _Muffliato_ on ourselves?"

He shook his head. Another blameworthy omission. Though he could feel the little stings, now. He didn't mind that; he was pleased to have shaken her own control enough to make her claw him, though a little sorry she hadn't screamed, as loudly as ever she wanted. Next time, if she let him have a next time, she would scream, or bite him, if she wanted to suppress the sound, and he would try to bite his hand rather than her slight body if he had to struggle again to hold back.

She released him and brought her hands around to where they both could see them. Yes, there were stains under several of the short neat nails, and no doubt scraps of skin. He flicked his wand to clean it away.

"That's nothing. But I'm sorry I hurt you."

She made a little Pfft! sound. "Just a bit. Nothing to worry either of us." She smiled. "I'm a witch, you're a wizard; if we're harder on each other than we meant, it's easily mended."

"You're a woman, so much smaller and more delicate –"

She snorted inelegantly, saying, "I won't break," and kissed him in affirmation.

A while later she said, "I'm not sure I want to walk all the way up the valley to the top, though."

"We can Apparate up to the car; Fernly won't have moved it."

He slid her off his lap, holding her until he was sure she had her balance, and took a few moments to appreciate the sight of her, naked but for the wand holster on her thigh. He took out his own wand and cleaned their mixed fluids from her body and then from his own.

She gave him an inviting smile and reached over for her hat, putting it on at a jaunty angle over her wild curls, freed by his eager fingers from their plaits, tilted her head and stood for a moment hipshot, one hand at her left breast, touching the still tightly furled nipple, the other held out to him.

He took her hand and kissed the soft pads of her fingertips, then said ruefully, "Indeed, I think we're lucky to be witch and wizard! Do you hear that? Rain."

She blushed, then murmured, "I thought it was my pulse, my blood still pounding, that I could hear."

He laughed, pleased that she hadn't taken her eyes off him once, and stood up, reaching for her sundress, handing it to her. "That rain is far too steady to be your pulse, my dear."

"Let's walk in it," she proposed, as she tossed her hat aside, stepping into her knickers and then her sandals, before pulling the dress over her head, and tidying her hair with a few quick motions of her wand. "I love summer rain!"

There were times when Lucius enjoyed walking in warm rain, and if it was something she also liked that was good, but he remarked, "This is spring, not summer. It may be rather cool. But by all means let's try. You did promise to navigate me out of this maze, after all."

Hermione looked out, at last, at the raindrops bouncing off the dry gravel and rapidly darkening it, and sighed. "That's too heavy to stroll in."

Up came her skirt hem, out came her wand, and that frivolous hat was transformed to an umbrella of the same shade of pink. Then she looked at her sandals, adequate for walking garden paths, but unsuitable for hard rain, and wrinkled her nose, before she transfigured them to closed shoes with thick soles and pink laces. Apart from the decorative stitching and puzzle pattern of pink and white cloth, they looked like the Muggle shoes Draco went running through their grounds in.

Lucius started dressing. It would be pleasant to stay here, enjoying being out of the rain, and hold her again, as she had silently suggested, to play with her hair and her nipples, and explore her to find her most sensitive places, and all the different scents of her body, but a picnic table and a set of short benches and gravel-covered ground was hardly the best place for that. In his armchair in his study, now... He had to try harder to get her to Malfoy Manor.

Before they left the little hut Lucius decided they needed more than her umbrella and anything comparable he could conjure up for himself.

He said aloud, so she knew what he intended, " _Impervius_!" Then as they stepped out he widened the area the charm covered, above them, so that the shelter ran the full width of the path and for several feet before and behind, to keep off the raindrops now vigorously bouncing. Nonetheless, Hermione opened her umbrella and twirled it once, before she held it at a slight angle so that the rib ends wouldn't bump his head.

She didn't linger over finding her way to the exit, though it took some time. Lucius wasn't surprised that her method had worked. She had already demonstrated how it worked; he didn't want the arithmantic proofs.

The rain had been cooler than either would like, though they had stayed dry; Hermione was evidently glad of her jacket, and soon after they left the hut's shelter used her wand to make it more substantial.

They looked up the slope to the multitude of greens silvered with water, and the longer, steeper rise to the top of the valley, smothered in trees; then Hermione said, "Not summer rain, no. It doesn't look as if it's going to stop any time soon. Why don't we just leave?"

"Agreed. But..."

She looked up questioningly.

"Would you come back to the Manor with me?" He could not say, "for coffee"; they had had that.

Feeling slightly and surprisingly desperate, he offered, "Severus doesn't get to speak to many people; I'm sure he'd be interested in discussing what you are doing."

Her gaze snapped to his after the first word, her breath caught, and he realised, belatedly, that she was hoping, even after all this time, for something he could not give her. He had not meant to pile more sorrow on the grief she seemed to share.

"I'm sorry," he said quickly.

Her eyes fell, and the soft mouth drooped for a moment.

"You're quite sure?"

"He died, Hermione. His portrait talks to us, that's all."

"He never appears in the frame that's supposed to be his, in the Headmistress's office..."

"He went there a few times to speak with Minerva McGonagall, but he doesn't want to see Dumbledore." He tried to lighten the sadness that oppressed both of them. "He holds a grudge as well as ever, and he has a particular objection to being deceived."

She tried to smile for him. "I'm sure he would. So you had the portrait painted?"

"Yes. Draco wanted it too. Once I was sure we were none of us bound for Azkaban, the first thing I did was remove all sign of the Dark Lord from our home." He hesitated. No, tell her now that the room in which mad Bella had tortured her no longer existed, any more than their dining room, which had held bad memories for both Draco and himself.

"Most of the ground floor public rooms were not just redecorated, but reshaped. About all I left was Narcissa's sitting room, and Asteria uses that; it's sunny, a good place for the children. My own study is in a different place now.

"Then Narcissa left," he shrugged ruefully, "and I had to convince Draco to go back to Hogwarts to get his NEWTs – as you did."

Tell her the rest, too. If he never showed her any vulnerability, she would never come as close as he wanted her.

"I was lonely, and ... lost in your new world, my own gone forever; even then, I knew that. I thought Severus might – stiffen my spine, or at least force me to behave as if I knew where I was going, in his presence. And I wanted to be able to talk to him, without the barriers of past years. So I hired the best portrait painter I could find, a French woman, Monique Fleurieu, you may have heard of her?"

She nodded minutely. Naturally; the Wizengamot had commissioned Fleurieu to paint Shacklebolt earlier this year, for the anniversary.

"She hadn't known Severus in life, but I had many photographs, and it's a good likeness." He hesitated again. "That last year, Severus was very much in control of himself, confident at meetings, extremely competent, but he looked tired, and grew even thinner."

"It was a horrible year for everyone." She looked up. "You too."

He nodded. "Severus doesn't look as he did then. I wanted to see him as he'd been after the first time Voldemort was banished, and before Potter came to Hogwarts – it was harder for him, after he had the boy before his eyes the whole time. In those years he was the most at ease, the nearest to happy, I ever saw him. I didn't have him painted as a younger man, but as the almost free man, who'd been my friend."

"I'm glad." After a long pause she said, "I would like to see that portrait. Even if Professor Snape doesn't want to speak to me."

Lucius was able to smile. "He's more sociable that he used to be. The portrait's in an upstairs corridor in the family part of the Manor, but I have an armchair in the alcove opposite; both Draco and I like to talk to him, and young Scorpius and even little Lyra and Callisto are fond of him – and not afraid at all."

Her shoulders braced. "I'll come. Thank you for asking me."

He was glad, and not just because she was at last willing. She still didn't want to enter his home, but she would make herself do it, and not simply for the chance to speak to Severus, he felt. So she too wanted to be closer.

She must know that she was giving him hope. Severus knew his mind – he could not think "his heart" – better than any. Severus seemed to find him trustworthy, these days, and Lucius knew that if Severus saw her willingness he might encourage her to trust still further. Then, perhaps, she might give him more than her body. He wanted her even more than he wanted her influence, and these days, too, he tried not to deceive himself, however disconcerting such a realisation was. He might yet have a partner once more.

Lucius took Hermione's hand and said, "Let's go!"

He Apparated them out from the maze to the car. Fernly was quick to open the doors, and to set the privacy screen without need of a word from Lucius. Hermione folded her umbrella and took off her coat and settled next to him; he put his arm around her, and felt her hand draw his closer to her breast. The car moved smoothly away, ready to slip magically along the Muggle roads between Cornwall and Wiltshire, evading the traffic on the most crowded, disappearing into the mist of rain. She set her head on his shoulder and sighed softly, relaxing now that her decision had been made.

"Show me your home, Lucius. I've never really seen it."

  


**+++LMHG++ The End ++LMHG+++**  


**Author's Note:**

> Written March 2009 for kereia for hp_springsmut. I might have gone on a lot longer, and introduced a lot more plot, if only it hadn't taken me far too long to write this! Just as well I didn't; it's better like this.
> 
> I am grateful to my beta readers slashpine and shiv5468 for going through this fic so quickly and carefully, to bethbethbeth for her check for a specific issue, and to the exchange mods for patience.
> 
> Glendurgan is real, of course. The laurel maze was designed by Alfred Fox, the owner and creator of the house and gardens, back in 1833. It's a National Trust property now. The best pictures of the place that I found are [here](http://www.gardensincornwall.co.uk/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=5). A good picture of the maze (including the luncheon hut) is [here](http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-vh/w-visits/w-findaplace/w-glendurgangarden.htm).
> 
> That production of _The Magic Flute_ was real, too, performed by Opera North; originally staged in 2003 and revived in 2007-2008.


End file.
